Ventura Sailing Club
What You Missed at Our Last Meeting(s)
VSC July 2026 meeting recap
Our meeting on July 14 at Victoria Pub was well attended by a group of hungry and thirsty
sailors. There was a lot of “recapping” going on with June being a very busy month in our
sailing world.
First oH, please welcome our newest members, Don and Olga Litton and their son Oliver.
They sail a 1962 Columbia 29 “Pythagoras,” which, if I’m not mistaken, might be the oldest
boat in our fleet. This has me wondering how many other boats we have from the 60s? I
think Chuck Manley’s “Spitdog” qualifies. We might have an Ultra Classic Plastic fleet
developing for the Wild Turkey Classic Plastic Race in November.
Bill Brayton gave us a rundown on the 14th annual Disabled Veterans Sail Day on June 14th.
Bill, with the assistance of Channel Islands Yacht Club, and many VSC volunteers put on
another great event giving disabled veterans a fun day of sailing the channel, viewing
whales and dolphins, and a nice barbeque dinner to top it oH. Eighty-five vets were aboard
20 boats. Akua Kai had eight people join us for a nice day on the water. This is the second
one that Alicia and I have done and I still can’t figure out who gets more out of the day, crew
or guests.
Bill also announced that the Mandalay Buoy has been hit and is severely damaged. He’s
organizing a work party to build another mark and while we’re at it, build a backup mark for
the future. He explained that the marks are a 20-ft. piece of PVC pipe with cement and
rebar in them and that it took a pretty large boat to knock the top oH the pipe. I’ll certainly
be giving those marks more respect now, knowing how substantially they are built. Bill also
thanked everyone for coming out to the Wild Bill Rig Race.
We welcomed Judi Glover to her first meeting with us. She is the new Association of Santa
Barbara Channel Yacht Clubs commodore filling Jane Thomas’s position. She is working on
our sailing calendar and will assist with coordinating resources for the new marks. The
materials to build them are not cheap. She recently moved down from Cayucos and will be
available to sail. She can be reached at judi.glover@asbcyc.org
June 27th was this year’s Adventure Sail for pre-teen and teenage girls that might not have
the opportunity to experience being on the ocean in a sailboat or being exposed to women
that have shaped their professional and/or recreational lives around the ocean. This is a
nationwide program that was built locally by Jane Thomas and remains as one of her many
legacies. Skills stations were set up at Channel Islands Yacht Club so the girls could learn
a little about the ocean, knot-tying, weather, navigation, and basic sailing skills.
Afterwords, they boarded boats and headed out for a sail to practice their new skills.
Alicia, CeCe, and Dawn Brooks took a group out on Akua Kai and several were asking how
to become a marine biologist or boat captain by the time they came in.
June 13th was our 22nd running of Frenchy’s Rum Run. We had 18 boats start and 16 boats
finish in 4 classes; PHRF Spinnaker, PHRF non-Spinnaker, ORCA, and Beachcats. Awards
were given to first and second places in each class. Thank you to Chris and Eric for creating
the framed pictures for the awards and to Chris for carefully selecting the bottles of rum to
be handed out as prizes for the “Rum Run.” See attachments for a write up on the race and
results. Results can also be seen on Regatta Network, and we’ll get the write up on the VSC
web page.
For awards, we’ve had good success with framed pictures of people’s boats for the most
part. We’ve encouraged everyone to take pictures and post on drop box at
https://www.dropbox.com/home/Ventura%20Sailing%20Club%20Photos/Frenchy%E2%8
0%99s%20Rum%20Run%202026 but,,,,, we don’t always get great pictures of all the boats
posted. We’d like to try something a little diHerent to ensure we have pictures that are
usable for awards. If everyone could take a picture(s) of their crew sometime on the day of
a race, we could use that as a plan B for awards, or a plan A if so chosen.
PBYC had their annual Milt Ingram race on July 11th. VSC was well represented in the PHRF
spinnaker class by Jane Brockman on “5150” who won the Lady Skipper award. Ron Dietel
aboard “She Said No” was the only finisher in non-spinnaker class, winning the class and
the Perseverance award after over 7 hours of sailing. Yes, the wind was that light, and we
only went to Platform Grace and back. “Velero” may have had VSC members Ryk
Cunningham and Larry Burrows aboard. I haven’t seen a confirmation of that. And Hall
and Alicia sailed Akua Kai. I use the term “sailed” loosely as we spent about 30 minutes
right next to the platform drifting on a glassy ocean. Fortunately, we had a pod of Minke
whales swimming around the boat wondering what we were doing and a White Shark
visited us as well. The wind filled in after finally getting around the platform and we had a
warm summer spinnaker run back to Ventura.
The Santa Barbara to King Harbor race is coming up July 24th. There are currently 97 entries.
VSC members Mike Warns on “5150”, Guillermo Ferramola on “Favor”, and Hall and Alicia
on “Akua Kai” are planning to sail.
PBYC’s Tri-Point Race is also coming up on August 8. This is a fun way to go around
Anacapa Island. Start is at Mandalay Buoy, round Platform Gina to starboard, round
Anacapa to starboard and finish at Ventura Harbor. In “normal” weather this can be a
broad reach, close reach, upwind on flat water on the backside of the island, and quite
often a boisterous reach back to Ventura. This gives the cruisers lots of reaching and the
spinnaker fleet an opportunity to use reaching sails on some “hot” angles. And lots of
reaching is always good for the beachcats, particularly the vintage ones without
daggerboards.
Discussion was held about VSC’s “Prison Break” sail that is scheduled for the weekend
after Labor Day. This event is on the calendar each year but there hasn’t been much
interest. Bob Shirley was the only person at the meeting that has done one. He explained
that everyone sails to Prisoner’s Harbor on Santa Cruz Island on Saturday, overnights there,
and in the morning the race begins with everyone raising their anchors, making their way to
the wind line by any means other than mechanical propulsion, and then sailing back.
Again, it appears there isn’t much interest, so another course was oHered up to the group.
Chris and Eric are interested in sailing a course from Mandalay Buoy to the Ormond Beach
Power Plant Buoy (they will confirm that it is still there) and back to Mandalay. This sort of
course might be a candidate for a reverse handicap start. Something to think about. Stay
tuned.
I oHered up the possibility of having another short-course beach cat race oH Ventura. We
have a couple of new beachcatters and it would be fun to get everyone out there again.
Alicia, aboard Akua Kai has oHered to set a mark and be race committee. We are working
on a date for that. Let me know your thoughts and if you’d like to sail or be on race
committee.
Treasurer’s report. $4200 in our account with about $400 in expenses from Frenchy’s to
pay. Regatta Network sent us a check for $519 for Frenchy’s. About 2/3rds of the
membership is current on their dues. Send us a check or use the venmo qr code attached.
At $80 per year nobody does it cheaper.
Don North says to send him any pics from your sailing adventures for posting on the VSC
media pages. We get thousands of clicks.
Alicia’s Island Report included information about Santa Rosa Island being open again postfire.
And reservations can be made now for trips to San Miguel Island in October, on Island
Packers. Prisoners Harbor on Santa Cruz Island will soon have a campground.
Reservations on rec.gov.
Chris and Marisela provided the pub quiz again to test our memories of important trivia.
Once again Bob Shirley showed his prowess in this department by winning and Judi Glover
was in a close second place.
VSC April 2026 Monthly MeetingApril meeting recap
Hello Ventura Sailing Club,
Thank you, Bob Shirley, for standing in as acting commodore and Lynda Blue filling in as
secretary. The show must go on, even if Chris, Alicia and I are out of town.
Welcome to our 2 newest members, Jon Rodriguez who is former owner of Green Flash and
Don Litton who has a Columbia 29, built in 1962. I’ll have more info. about them when their
membership forms arrive. With our expansion of boats built in the 60s, we might have to
institute a “super vintage” class for the Wild Turkey Classic Plastic race.
Bob reported on our first Anacapa Arch Race. We had 12 entries that were whittled down to
8 actual starters and 5 finishers. He reminded everyone of how a simple reach out and
back to the arch turned into a beat with everyone trying out diWerent strategies to get to the
arch and then a downwind sail back. In short, our simple race became a bit of a chess
match. And Anacapa Yacht Club was generous (once again) and Chuck Manley was
generous (once again) in hosting everyone after the race with food and drink.
Thank you AYC!
Bob announced the Beachcat Race coming up on April 19th. As of this writing that one’s in
the books. More on that later.
Frenchy’s Rum Run is up on Regatta Network. Please register if you’re planning to sail.
Most of the participants look at the “view registrants” link to see if there’s enough interest in
the race to commit. And speaking of commitment, when you register with Regatta
Network, it is possible to register without paying, and pay later. You just need to remember
to pay later. I’m not sure if they send you reminders or not.
Also, for the beachcats, now more than ever, you must register early. It will take a minimum
of 6 boats to pay for the fuel on the chase boat. And we need to make arrangements with
the chase boat early or we may not find one.
We’ve received 12 membership renewals to date for 2026.
Please remit via snail mail to:
VSC care of Hall Stratton
1186 Spring St. Oak View, CA 93022
or you can pay directly with
our QR code for our Venmo @VSCVenturaSailingClub (below).
Island Report: the Anacapa passage buoy was removed, it provided swell size and water
temp, not wind speed, and the east channel buoy will remain where it is, no funding to
relocate it.
Fishing boats have been catching bluefin tuna off Santa Rosa Island around Skunk Point,
where the water temp is been in low 70s last couple weeks
.
20 gray whales have been living/feeding off sand crabs at Bechers bay Santa Rosa Island,
blue whales are in west Channel, fin whales and Orca off Anacapa.
Eric proposed a new race for an empty calendar day on the race schedule. Start at
Mandalay, go to your home port, First boat to get it's entire crew to the AYC bar
wins.
The race calendar is on our website Venturasailingclub.org under racing news. Thank you
Eric!
Don North has been working with Alicia to keep our social media presence current. Thank
you both. He’s happy to accept any info., videos or pictures that promote the club’s
mission to “just go sailing.” Pics can be current or not.
And lastly, from the Commodore, leading the club this last couple of months has been a
dream come true. Why? Because members are making stuW happen! We no longer rely on
one person to get things done (Thank you Will because you were willing to shoulder that).
There’s lots of help coming from different folks and with that comes a better club.
VSC March 2026 Monthly Meeting
Our monthly meeting was well attended by about 20 sailing enthusiasts that included a couple of new guests, Steve and Cheryl Kornberg who live aboard their 50 foot sailboat in Ventura and have completed a circumnavigation. Our meetings keep getting more interesting as our presence in social media expands!
Tomorrow, Sunday the 15th of March, will be the Sail-Out for Captain Jane Thomas. Boats will be leaving Channel Islands Harbor at 10:00 am and headed for Platform Gina where a burial at sea will commence at approximately 10:50. Akua Kai will be leaving Ventura Harbor by 09:30. There will be a memorial at Channel Islands Yacht Club afterwards. See attachments for more information. I have 2 Wai'Lani purple pennants left if anyone is without one.
Discussion was held on the Anacapa Arch Race, April 11th. The plan is to start at Mandalay, go to Anacapa Arch Rock, round a mark that will be placed on the back-side of the Arch (no sailing through the arch), and return to Channel Islands Harbor entrance to finish. AYC has offered a post race gathering with food and bar open. Prizes will be pictures (that participants take) mounted on a plaque based on the number of participants in each class. There will be PHRF spin and non-spin class and an ORCA fleet. No beachcats for this one, as we haven't been able to muster enough interest to justify the expense of a chase boat. Hopefully next year.
NOR attached below and will be up on the website soon. SIs and entry form to follow.
On April 18th, we'll host a beachcat race off of Ventura Harbor. Alicia and crew aboard Akua Kai will provide 2 or 3 starts for beachcats to do a little short course racing to start the season off for the beachcats. Bob Shirley is helping to get this project off the ground. More info coming. Any non beachcatters are welcome to join Alicia to assist with race committee or to just be spectators as the beachcats go out and play.
VYC is hosting some dinghy one design racing on May 8, 22 and June 5 at 6 pm. We'll be contacting them about the possibility of a beachcat fleet if there is interest in this. Layne and I are definitely interested if we can get a couple of more boats.
We've started discussion about this year's Frenchy's race. Course will remain the same as past years but we talked about delaying the start until noon to take advantage of more wind for the race, however the boats that like the light air start would like to continue with the 11:00 start as in past races. So maybe we can try a 11:30 start? With a beachcat fleet we always want to make sure they are off the water before dark, but historically they manage to finish in somewhere between 3 hours and 5 hours and the middle of June gives us light until after 8 pm. More on that later.
The 2026 racing season has begun with the midwinters race at CIYC that hosted a one design J 24 fleet. PBYC's spring series started with VSC members aboard She-Said-No, Akua Kai, and Velero. And PCYC's winter series had VSC's She-Said-No and So Long racing.
Treasurer's Report - we have $4K in our account. We plan to purchase a new race mark. Our old one is practically invisible at a distance, so we'll pick up an Orange inflatable that is easily handled by our volunteer race committees. If we can't get one sponsored it will be about $300. I'm working with West Marine and Nautos on that.
Social Media - Facebook and Instagrams are being kept current by Alicia and Don North. We've had THOUSANDS of views! Please send your pictures and videos to Dropbox Ventura Sailing Club Photos.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/p3ahpp0wcetlg3yhcfsvi/AALeKTwmDKcEbFgqvbYMaO0?rlkey=srytfz6zlib1526maq3yhi1nn&e=1&st=2e1ilzmo&dl=0
Eric has updated our website and needs time sensitive info at least a couple of weeks before an event.
Chris and Marisela administered our monthly pub quiz. Thank you. Also, retired Harbor Patrolman, ex lifeguard, and surfski builder Merv Larson has donated his entire library of nautical books to the club. It's extensive and we'll have one box available each month for members to peruse and to add to their personal libraries. Oh, did I mention Merv was an Olympian too! He's truly as much of a "waterman" as you can get. I'll never forget watching him surfski C street in 1969 on a 15'+ swell with no one else out.
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